Amakusa Shirō

Statue of Amakusa Shirō at Shimabara Castle

Amakusa Shirō (天草 四郎, c.1621? – February 28th, 1638) also known as Amakusa Shirō Tokisada (天草四郎時貞) led the Shimabara Rebellion, an uprising of Japanese Roman Catholics against the Shogunate. They were defeated and Shiro was executed at the age of 16, his head displayed on a pike near Nagasaki. Since the late 20th century, he has been featured in popular culture as a character in numerous manga, anime, and video games.

Biography

Shirō was born in 1621 in modern-day Kami-Amakusa, Kumamoto as the son of Catholic parents, Masuda Jinbei (益田 甚兵衛), a former Konishi clan retainer, and his wife. (According to some sources, Shirō may have been the illegitimate son of Toyotomi Hideyori.) Portuguese Jesuit missionaries had been active in Japan since the late 16th century. By the age of 15, the charismatic youth was known to his Japanese Catholic followers as "heaven's messenger." Miraculous powers were attributed to him.^[1]

Shiro was among Japanese Catholics who took over Hara Castle in a rebellion against the Shogunate. The mounted a coordinated defense that held off attackers. But the rebel force had no logistical support and their resolve weakened. Shiro was said to display posters in the castle to raise morale, saying "Now, those who accompany me in being besieged in this castle, will be my friends unto the next world."

One of the rebel soldiers, Yamada Uemonsaku, betrayed Shiro. He got a message to the Shogunate that rebel food supplies were becoming strained. The Shogunate forces made a final assault, taking Hara Castle in the process. The Shogunate forces massacred almost 40,000 rebels, including women and children. Yamada, who betrayed his fellow rebels, was the only recorded survivor.

Death

Shiro was taken captive and executed after the castle was overtaken. His head was displayed on a pike in Nagasaki for an extended period of time as a warning to potential Christian rebels. His final words were: "I shall return after 100 years and take my revenge." Many Japanese Christians consider Shiro as a saint, but the Roman Catholic Church has not canonized him.

Honors

• A statue of Amakusa Shirō was installed at Shimabara Castle.

In popular culture

• He is the main character of the 1962 movie Amakusa Shirô Tokisada.
• He was popularized as the main antagonist in the 1967 Futaro Yamada novel Makai Tensho in which he is resurrected from the dead and is hunted down by Yagyū Jūbei Mitsuyoshi. It was adapted as a motion picture in 1981 as Samurai Reincarnation, an anime Ninja Resurrection, and a 2003 film Samurai Resurrection.
• Shiro is featured as a character in Fate/Apocrypha.
• He is the central antagonist in the Japanese manga XBlade by Satoshi Shiki.
• He is featured as a mitama in the PlayStation Vita role-playing video game Toukiden: The Age of Demons.
• In the manga Amakusa 1637, Shiro is not executed but is enslaved by the mentally unstable time traveler Naozumi "Kotaka" Yatsuka, who sees him as a stand-in for his unrequited love Natsuki (who bears a strong physical resemblance to Shiro).
• In the videogame saga Samurai Shodown, Amakusa is one of the main antagonists. Having lost his faith in the Christian God, Shiro fell in despair and made a deal with the demon Ambrosia.
• In the videogame Live A Live he appears as a spirit and is one of the enemies of the Secret Orders chapter.
• The character Amakusa Shougo from the anime Rurouni Kenshin was based on Amakusa Shiro. He and his followers are rescued from the Hara Castle siege by the protagonist and a Dutch ambassador and exiled to Holland.
• He is a demon known as Tokisada in MMORPG Shin Megami Tensei: Imagine and Nintendo 3DS role-playing video game Shin Megami Tensei IV
• The Gundam manga Crossbone Gundam: Skull Heart and its sequels feature a Mobile Suit powered by a clone of original Mobile Suit Gundam protagonist Amuro Ray's brain known as the Amakusa, referring to Amuro's Japanese heritage; he is martyred at the end of Mobile Suit Gundam: Char's Counterattack.
• In the anime series Kindaichi Case Files, Hajime Kindaichi went to the fictional Amakusa Island where Amakusa Shiro rumoured to have hidden gold in a treasure cave.

References

Further reading

• Ivan Morris. The Nobility of Failure: Tragic Heroes in the History of Japan. London: Secker and Warburg (1975)

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Amakusa Shirō.

• Amakusa Shirō Tokisada Web (Japanese)
• Amakusa Shirō (Kumamoto Rekishi Jinbutsu) (Japanese)

This article incorporates text from OpenHistory.